Often seen in trails carrying pieces of leaves back to their nests, these ants are just what they sound like: very efficient leaf cutters. Additionally, these ants can do a lot of damage to gardens as they cut up and carry away leaves of plants.Īmong ant species, the Leafcutter ant has a peculiar diet. Where mounds are made near human habitations such as roads, gardens, and farmlands, this species can inflict a lot of damage. The entire colony may house millions of individuals. The mound of the Leafcutter has a crater-like opening for the ants to carry food in, but the actually colony resides in the soil underground. Mature Leafcutter mounds can be as big as 90 feet in diameter, 18 feet deep, and may even be interconnected with other mounds to cover over a thousand square feet. While the Leafcutter ant’s capability to carry extremely large loads is remarkable, its colony may be even more so. Tropical and semi-tropical forests are the favorite habitat of a Leafcutter ant. Leafcutter ants are found mainly in tropical localities and usually build their nests in forests. Specifically this species is concentrated to the southern U.S. Leafcutter ants are sure to be seen anywhere there is a considerable amount of leaves or grass. Leafcutters have strong razor-like jaws with which they cut leaves. They have very long legs and are usually orange, red, brown, or black all over. The Leafcutter ant has four different castes of workers, ranging in size from just 1mm to over 16mm. How special is it that we can now also breed these ants ourselves and can offer them for hobby purposes at home or in a zoo, pet store or museum.Leafcutter Ant Scientific Name: Atta colombica All about Leafcutter Ants As did the founder of Ant's Kingdom, Jan-Peter Oudenampsen. Many hobbyists are fascinated by ants because they have seen this species in a zoo. Specific, own arrangement, ant farm available beginning of 2020Ī very special species that you can encounter everywhere in zoos and museums. We offer personal advice when purchasing a colony. Relatively small nests built from fungus, a fungus The larger the colony, the larger the ants that are added Specifications and information Scientific name: In addition, we are happy to give brief advice when purchasing such a colony. We expect to be able to offer an Ant Farm especially for this species in the beginning of 2020īecause this is a difficult, specific species, sensitive to temperature / moisture, we do not send it by post. The ant colony is only suitable if you have knowledge and experience with keeping ants. The colonies can only be picked up in our showroom, we also provide advice on nutrition. The ants use various leaves to make this fungus. These colonies are also easy to keep for hobbyists, since they grow to be several thousand specimens (in contrast to Atta colonies that can handle huge numbers (up to hundreds of thousands) of ants). This species is best known worldwide because of the fungus that they grow and the large quantities of leaves that they need.īecause of this unique trait, they are extremely suitable for (large) zoos, specific museums and pet shops. The leaf-cutter ant, Acromyrmex octospinosus 100-200, also called parasol ant from South America.
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